


How To Save A Life

by Chromi



Category: One Piece
Genre: Acceptance, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Buried Alive, Character Death Fix, Eventual Smut, Fix-It of Sorts, Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, M/M, Marco Doesn't Understand Anything, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Portgas D. Ace Lives, Rating May Change, Rebirth, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-30
Updated: 2019-10-22
Packaged: 2020-11-08 11:29:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 19,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20834732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chromi/pseuds/Chromi
Summary: Ace died at Marineford. Aceremembersdying at Marineford.So why is he alive - and buried - with nothing but a tiny blue flame flickering at his chest to guide him home?Fix-it where dying doesn't mean Ace stays dead.





	1. Prologue - a flicker of a flame

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update: 9th July 2020:
> 
> I'm not likely to finish this. What I want to do with it does not tie in with what the fandom wants, and I am also now not into MarcoAce. I do not want to bring Sabo into it, and I want to make Deuce a main character later on. The fandom doesn't want these things, so I'm probably not going to waste my time screaming into the void.
> 
> \----
> 
> If you have a phobia of being buried alive, this is not the fic for you. It isn't graphic, it isn't for long, but please know it is there.

The brain was the first organ to show any sign of activity deep down in the darkness, six feet below the gentle breeze rolling over the grass. A tiny spark of electricity, a signal pulsing from neuron to neuron. Not quite life - not much of anything - but it was _something_. A mark that things were beginning to happen.

Spark after spark, first minuscule but gradually building, commenced over the hours of naught. Ischemia and necrosis began to reverse approximately 12 hours after that first flash of activity, cells long dead beginning to rejuvenate, to regress from necrotic to healthy slowly, so agonisingly slowly. The rest of the body remained laying dormant, dead, not a breath passing into the lungs, not a single beat of the heart, not a conscious thought or an inkling that the impossible was happening, that the very certain death it had suffered was being undone like a knitted sweater being unpicked.

But the impulses were there, shivering along neurons with a progressive, building strength, flickers of revival in an otherwise silent, still tomb.

The heart began next. The heart, which had narrowly avoided total destruction, followed the same pattern as the brain did. Tissue revived little by little, the blackness of death brightening, filling out, giving way to healthy red over the course of a day, battling with the brain for favored cell rebirth.

But now the slowly reviving body faced a challenge. How was the heart supposed to function with the gaping wound punctured through the chest? The spine was severed, rendering the body functionally immobile. The lungs were damaged and ripped, the trachea destroyed, the ribs splintered, the liver beyond function. The blood couldn’t be allowed to start moving, the skin would have to wait to be restored, and the brain would not increase activity to the point of conscious _life _until the rest was ready.

So it went about it’s difficult, trialling diversion, the cells of the body not only being reborn in the most unnatural sense of the word, but having to work at division, producing more of themselves as they would have during their natural life cycle - but this time, they had to speed up.

It took a solid fifteen days of working ceaselessly, no part spared in the literal miracle that was occurring under the earth on the coast of Sphinx. The spinal cord went first, encased in it’s protective vertebrae and surrounded by a web of nerves, deemed in the grand scheme of things as being the top priority once the brain and heart were sufficiently salvaged; getting the body moving would ensure success in this endeavour. Next came the central nervous system. The organs followed - the liver, the lungs, the pancreas - before the arteries, veins, nerves, and bones outside of the spine followed suit, weaving and connecting to link with their other halves that they had crudely been separated from, empty chasms where the magma had burned away parts of them growing, dividing, _creating_.

A further five days saw the skin of the body entirely refreshed, scar tissue knitting tight across hard muscle at the chest and the back, obscuring the tattoo that had been ruined. The healing process did not care for the ink that had laid in the dermis, the reproduction of the design not even up for debate as far as it was concerned.

The capillaries mended next. The blood that pooled in the back of the body had life breathed into it by the process, oxygenated again for the first time in months. Bruising reduced, receding. Hemoglobin fell back into place, leaving the muscle and fat tissues. Cells restored, the heart pumped, and blood began to _move_ again. Slowly at first, the central muscle weak after so long of being, well, dead. It was almost tentative in its initial beats, finding itself again, not unlike a child returning to school again after the summer holidays and finding they had forgotten how to even hold a pencil correctly.

But it gathered steam, each beat becoming more powerful, and the brain in the highest point of the body was suddenly awash with blood delivered from the carotid arteries.

That low, basic level of electrical impulses ramped up.

Higher brain function returned.

Thoughts began to move.

The body convulsed, _alive_, finally truly _alive _again and on the verge of remembering something instinctual, something desperately important to continued survival—

Silver-gray eyes flew open.

Fetid, damp air was pulled deep into lungs that had forgotten how to breathe.

And Ace choked on the dank air, alive once more.

Alive, but very much buried under six feet of solid earth in complete blackness.

* * *

Once Ace had calmed down enough to stifle the panic attack, he found that his powers were gone. The fire was out within him, missing from inside himself as if Akainu’s fist had tore it from him. He felt weak, pitifully mortal and trapped more completely than he could ever recall being in his life.

Survival eclipsed all other thoughts, all traces of _how the fuck am I alive,_ and _why am I back_ pushed to the back of his mind as desperation set in. Without his fire he had no means of escape, no feasible way of getting out of his prison.

He clawed at the ceiling of his coffin, only dimly aware of the fact that he was lucky it was wooden. Wooden and damp with the soil above, easily breakable with the right application of strength. Ace kicked, willing himself not to panic again, not to use up the oxygen that he had, because this was his only shot, and he would be damned yet again if he let himself die a second time.

He had to get out. He had to get out and find Pops, his crew, his brave, stupid, blessed brother. He had to make things right, somehow, had to use this miracle for the best and live on through this one single regret he had.

He was drawing blanks on how the hell this even happened, his every thought focused on pulling soil into the coffin from the breach once he had kicked a hole in the wood, packing it down and loosening what was still above him. One name pervaded his consciousness over and over, memories of blue, of feathers, of _Marco, Marco, Marco_, as the only explanation for what had happened.

Marco the Phoenix. _Ace’s _phoenix.

But it couldn’t be his power. He wasn’t here, and Ace knew at some fundamental level of recall that Marco’s ability to heal others did not extend as far as reviving them from the dead and fixing up the level of damage that Ace had sustained.

It didn’t make sense, and yet there was something unmistakably _Marco-_ish about literally being reborn from death.

And Ace’s suspicions were further affirmed by the blue light that flickered into life as he stood, grunting with effort against the strain of the weight he pushed through.

A faint, quivering blue flame danced in the very center of his fresh, huge scar on his chest; Ace could only see it in his periphery, surrounded so completely by dirt as he was that he was unable to look down at it, hands scrabbling above himself as he felt the sea breeze cascade through his fingers. Yet he knew it was there, verified the light of it on squinting his eyes the barest inch open, feeling its familiar warmth radiating from within him.

With a burst of energy that came from the absolute terror of death buried like a zombie, Ace dragged himself free of what was supposed to be his final resting place, heaving and shaking once his shoulders were free. Fingernails dug into dirt to pull himself out entirely, retching as the beautifully fresh air filled his lungs, the putrid poison of the grave coughed away. He shook where he knelt, gasping for breath for several minutes and clutching at his upper arms to hold on to something real, grounding himself back into reality.

He wasn’t dead, even though he had died. He _had _died, he remembered it, remembered the pain and the misery and the feel of Luffy holding him in those final moments.

But he was here. He was breathing. He could hear the sound of his own voice moaning in shock, confusion, at his impossible situation.

Ace sat where he was for a long time - how long, he could only guess - looking down the rolling hill of green grass that led to what looked like a little village tucked away in the sloping valleys of the small island. He shivered violently, mind reeling, trying to figure things out.

His first priority had to be getting back to his crew. He _had _to see Pops, tell him how absurdly sorry he was, that he loved him, all of them, what it had meant to him to see them all there for his sake. No one could fake love like that. No one would have been prepared to spend their own lives in order to free his if they hadn’t loved him beyond measure. He wanted his brothers around him, to see their faces, to tell them he loved each of them beyond words.

He would find a way to make contact with Luffy once he had broken down before his father and captain. He hoped his brother was safe with his beloved crew, at the very least. He didn’t think he would ever be able to sum up his gratitude for his baby brother, quite certain that to see him face to face again would lead to tears.

And he would get to see Marco again…

Marco—

Ace looked down at his chest quickly, but the little blue flame had gone out. He knew without a doubt that it had been there, illuminating the soil around him, shining bright and cyan just like Marco did as the phoenix.

Ace ached for him, longing to understand the _how _and the _why _and the _what the fuck_.

But his attention was whipped away from his partner as the direction of the breeze changed suddenly, blowing his filthy hair backwards and causing something behind him to flap in the wind.

Something big, from the sounds of it.

Ace turned on the spot, having no idea how he would defend himself if it was something unfriendly.

But it was so much worse than he had been expecting.

His hat, necklace and dagger hung on top of his own grave, a sight in itself that he had never expected to see. But beside it stood the towering figure of Whitebeard’s grave, a sight that Ace had never _wanted _to see, let alone expected. His captain’s coat fluttered in the breeze, held aloft by his mammoth bisento.

It took a while to process what he was seeing. Perhaps a part of his brain hadn’t healed back correctly.

Or perhaps what he was looking at was simply too much for any one person to process.

And so Ace broke down at the foot of Whitebeard’s grave, sobbing into his hands with an inhuman whine of heart-wrenching pain as guilt threatened to drown him, pull him under and never let him surface. _It was his fault_. His fault. His father had died because of his stupidity, his short-sightedness, his mistakes and his shortcomings.

He couldn’t go back to the crew.

He couldn’t go back to Marco.

He would hide, try and think of a plan about what to do now. Change his appearance as best he could, never bare his back with blinding pride to show off whose man he was anymore, because now the world would only see him as Roger’s.

But for now, today, at least, he would mourn his true father, Edward Newgate, lamenting his own rebirth and praying for it to be taken from him and bestowed to the giant who slept below the son he had given his life for.

It was a damn shame for Ace that many, many miles away, Marco stopped mid conversation with Vista on deck of one of Whitebeard’s fleet, gasping in pain as what felt like a knife shoved deep into his heart.

He knew that feeling. He had felt it wrenched from within him that moment that Ace died right in front of him at Marineford all those months ago.

Logic told him that his instincts were wrong, that no matter what the evidence pointed at, there was no possible way it could be right.

But he knew.

Somehow, without a doubt, Ace was alive.

And Marco would find him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This idea is entirely thanks to RedHimiko18! Thank you for inspiring me!
> 
> This is just the prologue - the next chapters will be far longer, far more detailed, and will feature a happy ending (with some smut) because goddamn did canon not fuck over Ace and Marco enough?
> 
> I'm on [Tumblr](https://aishitekuretearigatou.tumblr.com/) if you want to come say hi!
> 
> Comments and kudos let me know if I'm doing something right, and I always love your feedback!


	2. Chapter 1 - Embers, Burning Bright

The first thing he was aware of on waking was how cold he was. It struck Ace as jarringly _wrong_, to feel this cold; his powers had worked wonderfully in keeping his temperature up against chilly nights ever since he had ingested the fruit, after all.

A flash of fear shot through him then and his eyes flew open, pulling him completely from the fog of the sleep he had unwittingly fallen into. Memories of Impel Down ran painful through his mind, as present as if he had only just walked free of his cell up the hundreds of stairs to his scheduled death, and Ace scrabbled at his wrists and ankles in a panic. No seastone cuffs. That wasn’t the cause of the bone-deep chill that was making every hair on his body stand on end.

It was dark - he must have been asleep for hours - and he was slumped against something very big, very solid, and very cold. The wind had picked up during his rest, whipping around his bare upper body and making him shiver violently. Ace rubbed at his arms in a useless attempt to warm himself, trying and failing to call upon his fire again.

It didn’t work. It really was gone, and he really was left powerless.

His cheeks felt raw, stinging, and his eyes stung, too. Ace blinked several times, gaze coaxed down the hill to the little village he remembered nestled there, the pinpricks of light telling him that yes, people were down there, none the wiser that Gol D. Roger’s murdered son had clawed his way back out of the earth like something from a cheap and cheerful zombie novel mere hours ago. Ace touched at his cheeks, the skin dry and tight, barely noticing that his fingers were caked in mud, and remembered crying. Sobbing, in fact, like his heart was breaking, like he had lost everything in a split second.

Because he had. It came back to him as he put a hand to the white marble he had fallen asleep against, traced the letters of the name of the man he had loved more completely than he had ever believed he could love another.

“Pops…” Ace murmured, and his voice sounded foreign to him, thin and cracked like the skin at his fingertips, splintered like his nails from where he had fought so viciously to get above ground. He touched the N of the word Newgate with his forefinger, his cheek following to rest against it. Perhaps if he sat here for a little while longer, whatever power had brought him back would seep down into the earth and work on Whitebeard, too. Maybe if Ace wished for it with every fibre of his being, he would die again and pass his life over to his father. His real father. Roger could damn well stay dead.

It was a pain more complete than that he had felt on his fatal impact. A pain that would not end with the blessed release of his own death, a pain that would haunt him for the rest of his second life. Because not only did Ace now have to face an existence without Whitebeard, he had to live with the fact that _he _had been the one who caused it. Any hope of going back to his crew, his family, was dashed, gone, because how could he even think of showing his face there now? Even if his men - no, not _his men_ anymore - accepted him back (which he knew they would, because he would have done the same), he would not be able to live with himself.

It was his fault, and Ace didn’t have a clue how he was supposed to deal with the weight of it resting painful in his chest.

Which left him feeling more completely helpless and isolated than perhaps even that moment of waking in his coffin and realising where he was and why. What was he meant to do now? Where was he supposed to go? He was, effectively, a ghost, a man who by all accounts should not exist in reality, and yet here he was, breathing, thinking, _living_ once again.

He had no crew. He had no power. He had no fucking ideas.

But Ace knew that sitting there in the cold would not bring back his Pops - if that were possible, Whitebeard would already be back, bursting out of the ground himself and making the earth tremble with his might, considering that Ace must have been asleep above him for a good few hours. Whatever had raised Ace wasn’t going to do the same for Whitebeard, and Ace almost felt like it had betrayed him in some way.

This _thing_, this _something_ that had done the impossible and resurrected his decaying body and attached his soul back to it did not, apparently, feel that Whitebeard deserved the same treatment. If this was an extension of Marco’s abilities - and even though it defied all reason and logic, Ace was absolutely certain it was him - then surely Marco would have prioritised his father over Ace? Ace sure _hoped_ that Marco would have, in any case. However much they had loved each other, Ace would harshly judge Marco if he had knowingly chosen him over the man who had saved him as a child and had given him his entire life.

Yet somehow he couldn’t convince himself that this had been the case. Such a detail shouldn’t have been important to him at that moment, given that his current situation was far more pressing, but it mattered to Ace a great deal. Just as certainly as he knew that his second chance was somehow linked to Marco, he was confident that this hadn’t been a choice, nor, most probably, a conscious decision. Because whatever he had been to the phoenix, Edward Newgate had been so much more.

And that was fine.

It took a long time for Ace to pry himself away from the colossal headstone of his father, stroking mud-caked fingers along his name one final time before turning, bleary-eyed with fresh tears, to his own grave. What a sight to behold - something that no one should ever get the chance to see. Yet here he was, looking at it, freezing, shivering, and half-wishing he was back down under there.

Reluctant to unfold his arms and give away what little heat he managed to hold to himself, Ace set to work on filling up and patting down the large hole in the ground that he had created. It was a fact that he clung to, a certainty in this sea of total chaos that was his rebirth, that he didn’t want this to be discovered. He couldn’t run the risk of a local, or perhaps even a visitor come to mourn Pops, stumbling upon the very plain evidence of his resting place having been tampered with. Alarms would sound, people would come to investigate, and at some point someone would insist on following that hole down through the mud and would discover it led to one very empty coffin.

Imagine what the world would make of the body of the son of the late Pirate King being stolen. No one would think for a second that Ace was _alive_; no, they would assume what would only come natural. What would happen then? The papers would riot, for starters, and in all likelihood his crew - _dammit, no_, not _his_ anymore! - would come to verify the commotion for themselves. And then _they _would riot, too, most likely.

No, Ace couldn’t have any of that.

Finally satisfied that the earth looked as undisturbed as he could make it, Ace took a moment to study his own headstone. It was beautiful just like Whitebeard’s and must have cost a hefty sum, yet Ace could barely appreciate that. His attention was pulled to the bunches of flowers that were laid all around it, the swords stabbed deep into the soil, some of which he recognised as belonging to those who had been under his command. It dawned on him that for there to be flowers, there really did have to be mourners coming to pay their respects - ill-wishers who simply wanted to spit on his body wouldn’t bring flowers, after all.

A choked off sob escaped Ace before he could fully bite it back, the salt of his fresh wave of tears making his eyes sting even worse than before. People had _cared_, and still continued to care, if the freshness of the bouquets were anything to go by. It hurt because he didn’t deserve their endless love and support, not when he felt like he could crumble under the weight of his own guilt at any moment. Yet despite it all Ace found himself reading the cards and notes they had written, a handful of names leaping out at him and many that he had never heard of, all lamenting his passing, each one offering words of comfort to a young man taken too soon.

It was too much. Ace turned away again, teeth clenched to stop the body-racking sobs from coming back for another round. He accepted their love, even if he didn’t deserve it. He would let it fill his heart with more than just misery and loss, understanding that their words, their gestures, were in no way any less powerful than Whitebeard’s fleet and his entire host of allies making their stance at Marineford. He was truly loved, and he was entirely not worthy.

He left his hat and his necklace where they fluttered in the wind, only taking his dagger back after walking to and from it three times, mind constantly changing. To take the hat and necklace would be to identify himself as readily as if he were screaming his name into a megaphone, just like baring his arm and back would. He would miss them, those accessories that had helped draw notice to his person in his quest to become known to all, but leaving them behind was a necessity. The dagger would come in handy at some point, he figured, helping secure his decision.

Walking away from Whitebeard was harder than it had any right to be. Trudging down the hill, body practically blown down the slope with the wind to his back, hurt more than Ace would ever be able to describe to anyone. Not only did it feel like he was abandoning his father, it left him acutely aware of the suffocating reality, yet again, that he did not know what to do now. He had _always _known what to do, where to go, how to conquer each and every little obstacle that his poor hand in life had dealt him. Each decision the correct one, never looking back, always sure and always headed due north to the brightest star that was his future. Because Ace did not do regrets. Ace planned (albeit not always far ahead), and he saw it through, and he _achieved_, even if _what_ he achieved wasn’t always what he had originally set as his goal. Goals changed, people grew and learned, and he was no exception.

So what now? There was no plan. There was nothing beyond where he _couldn’t_ go, what he _couldn’t _do, and who he _couldn’t_ seek out. Even when he had set out from home with Luffy waving him off all those years ago now, even when he hadn’t had the faintest idea of where he would go or who he would meet, Ace had had a plan. Find a crew, make a name for himself, surpass Roger. It had been vague and meandering - he would have never pretended it to be otherwise - but it had been concrete.

This, though? This didn’t stretch further than stealing a shirt at the first chance he got, possibly some food if he could find it, for his stomach ached and churned on itself for some nourishment to organs and tissue that had performed literal miracles, now crying for enablement to see themselves function like a normal human without the use of that flickering flame.

And once again, Ace’s thoughts were drawn entirely to Marco and his blue flames. Only for the briefest of moments, though, as his attention was captured wholly upon approaching the village proper, keeping to the shadows of the houses in the dark of the evening. He could smell food, something homely and delicious, if his senses were to be trusted, something laced with the full-body aroma of _meat_. Filling. Satisfying. His stomach urged him on, roiling as if threatening to digest itself on the spot if Ace didn’t find a way to fill it forthwith.

It came from a home on the edge of the village just a few brisk strides from the house he crouched behind, and they were cleared in no time. His eyes were immediately drawn not to any sign of food, sadly, but to a line of laundry that still hung precariously in the wind, flapping madly, most likely forgotten by the family inside. Ace snatched at a shirt that looked vaguely in his size and slipped it on, buttoning it to the bottom of his sternum out of sheer force of habit of keeping his chest bare to allow for the heat of his powers. It saddened him to cover what was left of Whitebeard’s mark - he had no way of checking the extent of the damage, but Akainu’s aim had been a damn good one - yet he couldn’t deny that having some form of cover from the wind was a relief.

He stole away with the howl of the high winds covering any sound he made, treading light through years of practice yet clumsy still in his gait. His muscles worked furiously to keep him upright and moving, practically shrieking in protest at being made to cooperate when all they had known for the last who knew how long was total death. It was slow going, it was tiring, but Ace made it a little further along the last curve of neatly built wooden houses without interruption. The food he had smelled at the other house would go untouched by Ace; he couldn’t risk revealing himself to whoever was inside just for something to eat.

Although, admittedly, he ran the huge risk of just keeling over dead and revealing himself to _everyone _if he didn’t find something soon.

He was still very much in two minds about whether simply giving up and dying again would be preferable to this confusion. Ace wanted answers, the need for them growing stronger with each step he took, yet he could not go looking for them. He would have to accept that this was something to chalk up as a miracle, not Marco’s doing, _definitely _not his old partner’s already incredible power going further beyond anything either had known (because surely Marco would have _mentioned _he could raise the dead if he had known he could), since he would not be able to meet the man himself and ask the question of ‘so hey, was this thanks to you?’

For now he would not pack it all in, though. For now he allowed himself to be guided by the overwhelming _ache _for food, leaving his craving for knowledge to wait in its wake. To wait and to fester and to consume his dreams when he later fell asleep instead.

That instinct to feed forcibly dragged Ace to the garbage neatly disposed of behind the back of yet another house, hands digging into the mulch of waste without a hint of shame in what he was doing. This was not below him and it never had been - he wished he could say the same for some lesser men he had met on his travels - taking on any means of survival even if it did make his skin crawl when something slimy squelched against the back of his right hand.

Ace plucked out what looked like the leg of a chicken, probably, intact and cooked, completely untouched. He bit into it without hesitation, only dimly aware of the fact that these people were wasteful fuckers, obviously, but their stupidity was his absolute gain. His stomach growled happily as his throat worked to swallow something solid once again, the newly grown back esophagus spasming on contact with the dry meat. Ace coughed, spluttering, clamping a hand to his mouth to keep quiet lest he drew attention, but the howl of the wind seemed to sufficiently mask his choking fit; he carried on with an almost heedless abandon, eyes darting this way and that as he chewed.

It was only some minutes later when he rolled back the sleeves of the stolen shirt to prepare for his next dive into the unknown that he saw it. A newspaper shoved in alongside the food waste and various other trash, folded and torn a little but still readable. He pulled it out with a snatch, desperate to find out how long he had been dead, if there was any news about his brother or Whitebeard’s crew or _anyone_, God, give him _something_.

The date on it caught him by surprise. He had known the date of the war, his scheduled execution, because he had been told it multiple times during his imprisonment. Ace hadn’t been allowed many things in there - not proper shoes, socks, a damn thumb freed to scratch at an itch on his back, even - but a countdown to his doom was provided free of charge with every meal they had force-fed him.

He had allegedly been dead for just over eight months, according to the paper. _Eight months_.

Ace’s hands shook as he read the date again and again, frantically questioning his ability to do basic math because eight months? Eight entire months? He didn’t feel like he had been gone for that long, although, admittedly, he had no way of knowing what it should feel like to be resurrected after _any_ length of time. As far as he was concerned, everything in his body was working as it had before death, functioning well and all in order, struggling a little, yes, but good and intact. Nothing _felt_ like it had been dead and rotting - did people rot eight months after death, or did it happen later? Sooner? He didn’t know - before springing back to life.

His eyes scanned lower down the paper, and Ace immediately gasped as he took in the photo on the front page that had been folded under itself. Teach’s laughing face under the headline that stated his crew had acquired another of Whitebeard’s territories had Ace hurrying to read the article, ignoring the way his stomach protested his change in priorities.

_Blackbeard tipped for position of Yonko?_ read the paper. It went on to detail how Blackbeard’s crew had taken control of a tiny island that Ace knew to be peaceful and powerless, somewhere that had really benefited from their protection and status. Who knew what would become of it under Teach’s rule? But it was the arrogance of the tone of the article that made Ace grit his teeth with fury, made him remember yet again that he had no fire to call upon and burn the news of Blackbeard’s tirade. The article was written in a mocking manner, almost pointing at Whitebeard’s remaining crew and laughing, slinging around the question of _why aren’t they doing more to stop this? Where is their new captain now, ignoring the loss of their territories?_

Their new captain…

Ace read on, lip curling in disgust as the writer of the article simply did not let up on the Whitebeards, using any and all excuses to jab at them and question their fabled power and prowess.

_Previously commander of their first division, Captain Marco the Phoenix is clearly only a legend in breed of Zoan_, the newspaper read, _riding on the coattails of his late captain and father figure, the truly legendary Whitebeard. Marco has made no move to intercept Blackbeard’s challenge against them, sending out the message that the once immense crew no longer troubles itself with what becomes of those under their care. Perhaps it is better for the people of Chilcot Island to be taken over by Blackbeard?_

Marco was captain now. It didn’t come as anything of a surprise to Ace, yet it was comforting to confirm in black and white that his partner was still alive.

Ace didn’t know how long he stood on the spot behind the wooden house, reading and re-reading the article, trying to gain as much information as he could from it, reading between the lines, so to speak. Marco was captain. They were losing their influence in the New World and, by the sounds of it, their status as a Yonko crew was either on the rocks or already taken away. The papers were against them, although that wasn’t entirely out of place, trying to convince the public to turn with them, and there was no doubt that in some places this was bearing the fruits of success. Whitebeard and his men would always have those who remained loyal throughout, but to those who had never known him well, it couldn’t be much of a task to drag his and Marco’s names through the mud.

What was curious, though, was the article writer’s apparent pro-Blackbeard take on the whole situation. It was unnerving, worrying Ace. Since when did the papers make any attempt to speak well of pirates? What the paper didn’t detail was how many times previous this had happened, how many other islands and cities of Whitebeard’s that Teach had already successfully stolen, how many times Marco and the others had attempted to make a stand but had failed, if at all. The dynamics of the world were changing, the balance upset and the order of the past beginning to crack and shift.

The paper raised more questions than it answered, and Ace wished he hadn’t found it at all. It was just one more thing to bear, another loop in the rope that was winding itself into a noose for him to stick his neck in and tell Death himself to do his job properly this time.

At the very end, in those last moments where everything hurt and nothing mattered except telling them all that he was thankful, Ace had accepted that he did not want to die. Not the way he had, and not at all. Considering this, remembering it more vividly than any other memory, he thought maybe he shouldn’t be so ungrateful for his second chance. He had got what he wanted, hadn’t he? He was alive and well, fit and (almost) healthy.

But the world he came back to was so far not doing anything at all to entice him into staying. This was not the way it was supposed to go. Pops was not supposed to fall after he did. They were not supposed to be publicly humiliated and turned against. Teach was supposed to be the target of their wrath, not building up to snatch up the title that Whitebeard had held since before Ace had been born.

It was all wrong, so _wrong_, and Ace himself was directly responsible for it.

He was certain that the only thing left that could possibly make him feel any worse - and would definitely be enough to finish him off properly this time - would be to learn that Luffy had perished, too. But there was no mention of him in the paper, the pages utterly devoid of anything to do with the boy or his crew. Ace took comfort in this, clinging to his one sliver of something _good _in this nightmare. No news was good news.

With his stomach aching and twisting in knots around his rather meagre meal, Ace scurried away from the village as quickly as his unsteady legs would carry him. He headed down, down the gentle slope of the village, around the fields and farmland, keeping out of open areas as much as possible.

It took some time to find the coast again in the dark. He went a different way, not having any desire to head back to his grave and take to the sea there, meeting a waterfall and passing through the freezing flow to the other side. He knew the sea lay beyond it but couldn’t pinpoint why, didn’t _care _why. All Ace knew was that he wanted to get off this island, take his chances in the open water of the New World, as stupid as that may be, and see where he ended up. He didn’t have a log pose, he didn’t have a map, but he had the stars overhead, his will, and his drive to distance himself from his supposed final resting place, even at the cost of truly leaving Whitebeard behind this time.

He bitterly counted himself lucky to find a small boat on the shore once he got to the beach, flimsy prison-issued shoes crunching in the sand. _Lucky_. After all that had happened. What was not quite so lucky, though, was the hypothermia he was certain to die of if he didn’t warm up, shivering with a whole-body spasm; he was drenched from the waterfall and the wind was as fierce here in the open as in the valleys, whistling through the rocks and coves.

His mind was filled with the impossible task that loomed over him as he shoved the little boat out into the water, body hurting and urging him to stop. Ace hissed as his hand slipped on the prow and nicked his thumb; he brought it to his lips to suck at the cut but found there was nothing there, no wound or blood. Odd. Luck must really be on his side tonight in the strangest, most mundane of ways.

A flurry of sand was kicked up when Ace tumbled into the tiny craft, hitting the bottom with a bang, still not used to how unsteady his body was. If his luck continued in its current fashion, maybe his body would start to return back to how he had remembered it rather than feeling like a puppet being clumsily directed on a set of strings.

The black sea water rocked the boat gently as he pushed off with the oar that he had hit his forehead against. Travelling blind into the New World was most definitely the worst decision he had made so far today, maybe ranking up there in his top 5 worst decisions in his life, depending on how it turned out. But he was off, and he had a temporary plan at last, one that gave him a purpose and drive, if only for a short while: find next island, don’t die, find more food. What came after that remained a mystery, something to be discovered nearer the time.

Ace snatched up a short piece of cord that tickled at his ankle and tied his matted hair up with it as best he could; it was longer that he remembered it, growing just slightly past his jawline and thick with grime and dirt. The stories he’d heard of hair continuing to grow even after death must have been true, and in his case it served him well, allowing him to do something else to alter his appearance ever so slightly. He would need to do more, though, if he could, although he was drawing blanks at _what_ at that moment.

He pulled on the oar with far more difficulty than he reasonably should have found it, breath heaving with the effort of it. “Now,” Ace grunted to himself, once again finding his voice to sound unpleasantly thin and tired, “bring me that horizon.” And he wheezed a laugh at the reference to the character of a story he had once heard during happier times with the Whitebeards.

He still didn’t know what to do. He still couldn’t think about what was to come after he made it to the next island - _if _he made it to the next island. The ache for Marco was ever present, resting alongside his worry for Luffy’s safety, both unmatched by his guilt, his sorrow, for Whitebeard’s passing.

Where was he supposed to go, what was he supposed to do, in a world where he should not exist? In a world where, now that his true identity had been revealed, he could not be _allowed _to exist?

“I am _not _Roger’s son,” he hissed to himself, pulling on the handle of the oar. “My name is _not _Gol D. Ace. And I am _not _a Whitebeard pirate anymore.”

He didn’t have a clue.

* * *

Marco’s hand flew to his chest as a gasp of pain left him unbidden, the shock from the sudden stabbing feeling preventing him from covering up his discomfort from the others around him. Vista frowned at him, concern for his captain rolling off him in waves, and he lowered the report he had been discussing. Vista, luckily, was a man of observation rather than of direct questioning, and Marco couldn’t pretend he wasn’t relieved that Vista didn’t draw attention to what was happening by asking if he was okay.

Something was wrong. Or, in actuality, possibly very _right_, if Marco was reading his body correctly. Worry at the new sensation chased the flutter of tentative happiness around in his chest, barely daring to hope, yet _knowing_, somehow, that he was right, that his instincts were never wrong.

Something in Marco had died with Ace in that moment he had been murdered at Marineford.

Literally.

Everyone said the same line when discussing that fateful day - “a part of me died when I saw Ace’s body,” or, “I feel like my will to live died with Pops.” It wasn’t uncommon in the slightest to feel that way, and Marco was with the men on this one. The first couple of months after the war had been indescribable, and Marco didn’t think that he would ever be able to convey that level of misery, of hopeless _nothingness_, to anyone else. The others felt it, naturally, but Marco had privately thought (at the expense of hating himself for admitting it) that he had had it worst.

Setting aside the obvious point of Pops being his absolute everything, Ace had been his partner. Boyfriend. Lover. Soulmate. Whatever anyone wanted to call their relationship. But more than that. More. So much _more _than just someone to love, to cuddle with in the dark, to laugh with. Ace had always been emotionally unobtainable, the impossible prize, according to his ex-first mate, someone who appeared on the outside as open and present, yet remaining closed off and drawn on the inside.

Marco had broken it all down in a way that no one else ever had - not Deuce, not his brother Luffy, not even Pops. Their devil fruits had helped, giving them a link that transcended physical and mental relationships, bonding them at their most fundamental bases of existence, completing each other. Becoming more than two single people, merging them into one soul, together at last.

Ace had filled Marco’s heart with something irrevocable, something beyond love. Ace had quite literally completed him, filling in the blanks he had learned to ignore, giving him purpose that he had hitherto not recognised as needing, going above and beyond any and all expectations by just being himself. Ace had been Marco’s flame to his phoenix, raging and brilliant. An unstoppable force. The quietly dancing embers that shrouded him in their blissful heat at the end of a difficult day.

So when Marco lost him on the battlefield to Akainu’s magma fist, when Marco had been cuffed and had _panicked _and lost his head precisely when he couldn’t afford to… something had broke within him. Something had physically been pulled from him, not unlike pulling a thorn from the pad of a lion’s foot, and it - whatever _it _was - had been lost to him ever since. His chest ached, his heart beating around the hole that had been left, the one that didn’t heal.

Marco had reasoned that surely, _surely_, nothing _physical _had happened. There wasn’t actually a great bleeding fissure in his heart. He had reasoned this as soundly correct, yet he had still had a go at consciously healing himself. Nothing had happened, and he had chalked it up to nothing more than acute heartache.

But now, here on deck of his ship just over eight months since his world went dark in the absence of his sun, that splinter, that thorn, had just been shoved right back into him. And, crazily, despite the pain of it, the surprise at the suddenness of it, Marco felt a warmth within him. Warmth of the kind that had been missed dearly, something that had been like a direct link to Ace’s own life and energy.

“Vista,” Marco said quietly, trying to turn the rubbing motion at his chest into something that would pass for a scratch at a vague itch, “I need a moment alone with that report.” He held out his hand to take it from his commander, giving the bigger man a significant look. “I’ll come find you again when I’ve had a chance to mull it over.”

There was to be no mulling, and in fact Marco was confident that Vista knew he wouldn’t even glance at the title on the paper once he was shut away in his room. “Of course,” Vista said, feigning absorption in his work with ease, “I hope you find the notes on the second page to be of use.”

“I’m sure I will. Thank you.”

Marco left him with a nod, a promise that he would explain once he had had a chance to think with his head in his hands for a good half an hour or so.

He sat at his desk and rested his face in his palms with a groan once he had closed the door behind himself. The room still didn’t feel right to him, a cabin that opened onto the deck of the ship that was not the Moby Dick. This would have been the captain’s quarters had there been a captain on board to fill it, but given that Whitebeard had resided on the Moby, this room had been used as a food storage area until Marco had moved in. He disliked it almost as much as he abhorred the title of _captain_. That belonged to Pops, whether dead or alive.

There was no reasonable explanation for what he was feeling. He didn’t doubt his body nor his ability to read it, not after this long of being more in tune with it than surely any other human was with their own. He was intimate with the feeling of pain, having grown back his left arm once after a vicious fight in his early 30s (something that he was now ashamed for sneering at Shanks about when he had met the captain for the first time since Shanks had lost his own left arm) and having healed more wounds than he could ever feasibly remember.

However, despite having contracted the most horrific of diseases, he would have been lying if he said he knew what it felt like. It was an inevitable result of being the leading doctor (and often the _only _doctor) on islands under their care that became infected with necrotizing fasciitis, tuberculosis, and a whole host of others that would have most likely ensured the death of anyone _but _him. His powers never failed to heal him before symptoms showed their ugly faces, destroying the viruses and bacteria upon entry into his system.

Marco had survived and regenerated from just about everything imaginable and at too many times to count, and this sensation didn’t compare to anything he had come across before.

Except, of course, that moment in Marineford.

But this train of thought went cleanly against the order of the world, of almost every living thing except for himself. Ace could not come back to life. That was not up for debate. Ace hadn’t had regenerative powers. Marco didn’t even know if he could bring _himself _back from death if he was ever killed - he had, understandably, never attempted to end his own life in a bid to learn the extent of his powers. Even he had limits, limits that were remarkably far more lax than the average person’s tolerance to injury and pain.

Upon ingesting his fruit as a young boy, Marco had developed an almost morbid curiosity in just how far his powers extended. He had taken a kind of clinical approach to testing it, starting with small scratches to the back of his hand, watching with a fast-growing sense of boredom at how his skin healed with a flash of blue flames before he even had a chance to think about it. The healing process was always immediate, just like how the body responds to the cold by shivering, or how the heart beats without conscious guidance from the brain. Marco’s powers were no different, and after a little experimentation, the child he had been had figured out that he could hold off healing if he knew the injury was coming and he actively _stopped _himself healing. It had taken practice, and quite _why _or _when _it would ever be useful remained a mystery, but Marco had wanted to know _everything _about his incredibly valuable powers.

When he had told Ace about this, Ace had promptly bitten him on the neck and warned him not to heal it until given permission. He had never received it, and his body had healed the tiny puncture wounds in the good old fashioned regular human way instead, much to Ace’s keen interest.

So then why, given that he knew all that he thought there was to know about his power, was this happening to him? The logical answer eluded him and it left him deeply uncomfortable, never one to stray far from logic and solid truths.

The only viable explanation was that Ace _was _alive. That, or something new was developing within him, and yet Marco could not convince himself that was the case. After being alive for longer than he cared to admit to, there were no surprises left that his powers could unveil.

With a shuddering sigh that seemed to be pulled from the bottom of his abdomen, Marco tried not to give in to the excitement that was climbing up his chest and threatening to burst out of him. _Ace was alive_. He had to be. How? No idea. But even the phoenix side of himself seemed to know it to be true, that small space in the back of his mind that reacted purely on the mythical bird’s instinct crooning for its mate.

_ _Ace is alive. Ace is back. Ace isn’t dead anymore._ _

It sounded more ridiculous with each variation of the same thought, the words echoing in his mind with every pass. He couldn’t be. _He couldn’t be_.

But he _was_. That shard of Ace’s own life - Marco couldn’t think of a proper clinical name and so went with the romantic - had buried itself back inside it’s true home, brought back from utter destruction along with its owner, surely. His phoenix instincts were growing frantic within him, setting his nerves on edge and making his blood run hotter, the need to fly, the desire to _go_ and get Ace back building the longer he sat there.

Marco leaned back in his chair, gazing at his open palms. His fingers were trembling slightly, his breath quickened and shallow with the constriction in his chest. He couldn’t afford to get ahead of himself. He couldn’t build up to a beautiful image of a tearful reunion only to have it come crashing down when it became apparent that he was wrong.

He had to be wrong. He _had to be_. But damn everything to hell and back if he didn’t _want _to be.

And then, quite suddenly and out of nowhere, Marco sneezed.

His body tingled with the force of it, blinking away the tears that accompanied, utterly perplexed. Marco couldn’t remember the last time he had actually _sneezed_. That was the beauty of his phoenix powers, possibly his favorite feature that he had definitely grown too reliant on; Marco did not get sick. Ever. He never fell victim to the colds that did the rounds in the crew with every shift in the climate, nor did he ever get indigestion, blisters, flu, fever, or headaches. He even didn’t succumb to impaired vision like his body kept trying to introduce, his eyes retaining their shape and strength through tiny unconscious fixes throughout each day. He wasn’t lined around the eyes, forehead or mouth like he should have been at his age, something that he had enjoyed rubbing in Thatch’s face before everything had changed.

No, nothing ever went _wrong _with Marco’s body, which entirely accounted for his fight, flight, or flee response being triggered by such a mundane, routine action as _sneezing_.

He stood swiftly, heaving a great sniff. His sinuses were beginning to hurt, feeling stuffed up with cotton wool, brought on by the sneeze.

His body should have taken care of any invading germs he could have picked up. This was supposed to be an unconscious, routine act, fighting off infection like he had all his adult life. What had changed? Marco drew a blank there, because he could not link the stabbing in his heart to the sudden shift in his regenerative abilities. The two held no association to each other; it was a coincidence.

Marco didn’t like coincidences.

He concentrated, eyes closed and brow pulled down in a frown, and actively snapped his abilities into gear. With conscious effort, with a difficult, searching mapping of himself down to a cellular level in order to find the invading force, Marco’s healing flames manually located and purged the virus that had started to take hold. He couldn’t help but marvel at its timing, seeing as he had only felt Ace’s revival some thirty minutes ago.

_No, that’s stupid, they are _not _related. This is a coincidence. Causation and correlation and all that._

And the event was soundly pushed from Marco’s mind as he left his room again, intent on gathering his commanders for a meeting. The problem was a trivial one in the grand scheme of things, something that could wait, assuming, of course, that he didn’t forget about it, losing it to the excitement that was sure to come.

Right now, it was far more important to put his thoughts regarding Ace to his closest brothers and see what they made of it all. He half hoped they would tell him that he was reading too much into this, that he was experiencing nothing more than a twinge of anxiety over the upcoming attack they were planning on Teach. They would set him right either way - they always did.

Marco didn’t enjoy heading these meetings, the ones that he had used to attend sitting alongside Ace, opposite Thatch, on Whitebeard’s immediate right. He detested it all, this perverse game of captain that he played. The papers loved it, though, really doubling down on the guilt and the blame, wasting no time in labelling him unfit to fill Whitebeard’s boots, calling him a coward who had stood by and not only let his fellow commander die without a fight (because god forbid they recognise how hard he had struggled to reach Ace prior to losing his head), but also one who followed his captain’s orders to the bitter end, resulting in his death. He didn’t need unknown reporters spitting acid at him over this; he knew it well enough without their help.

He appreciated Vista’s help in rounding them all up, none of the commanders away from what was left of the fleet for once. They sat at the huge, long table that was so like the one they had used on the Moby, with chairs of various sizes around it to accommodate their differences in height and bulk.

When at last Fossa had shut the door of the meeting room and had taken his seat, Marco cleared his throat. He did his absolute best not to let his gaze be drawn to the three seats that remained empty - those reserved for the first, second, and fourth divisional commanders. The roles for the fourth and second had still not been filled out of respect for Thatch and Ace, the first still vacant because Marco had not been able to locate the person he deemed a suitable replacement for himself yet.

But that was an entirely separate issue in itself, and definitely one he would have to address again at some point soon.

As if he didn’t have enough to be worrying about as it was.

“Thank you for assembling so quickly,” Marco opened the meeting, voice strong and commanding, “I appreciate that you are all busy, so I won’t keep you longer than necessary.” The looks he received told him that they thought that anything he had to say was far more worthy of their time than whatever they had been involved with prior. Marco wasn’t sure how long they would continue to think in this vein once they heard the utter nonsense he was about to come out with.

“Is this to do with that article in yesterday’s paper?” Haruta asked, leaning forwards on his elbows.

The article which so kindly wrote about Marco’s incompetence and apparent lack of care towards those they were responsible for. These were not unusual anymore, and Marco actually somewhat enjoyed seeing what they came up with to use against him each week in a bitter, twisted sort of fashion. The pro-Blackbeard stance was a new one, though, and something that they would need to keep an eye on. The people of Chilcot Island were not, in fact, in the process of being taken over by Blackbeard. As their own scouts had determined, the Blackbeard crew had actually only stopped off for supplies, thrown their weight around a bit, and then left after declaring that that particular island was not worthy of wresting from the Whitebeards. At least not yet.

_Lazy right down to the bone, aren’t you, Teach?_

“No, Haruta, it isn’t,” Marco corrected, “although I hope you all enjoyed their complete lack of fact checking as much as I did.”

A ripple of murmured laughter sounded around the table.

Marco braced his palms on the smooth wooden surface of the table, pausing for a moment to try and decide how best to approach this. No matter what he said, no matter what he led with, it was going to sound insane.

“I asked you here this afternoon because I need to discuss something with you all,” Marco began, looking up at them all in turn. “You’re going to think I’m losing my mind, and frankly I’m wondering the same thing.” He took a deep breath, closed his eyes for a little longer than a blink, and said, “I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but I believe Ace is almost definitely alive again.”

The silence was almost palpable, thick and congealing in the air around them, suffocating any possibility of retracting his statement. Each commander looked shocked, disbelieving - Izou openly gaped at Marco, frowning.

“Blunt and to the point, as always,” Vista said with a sigh, stroking at his moustache as was his go-to response to any form of news, “no use dressing up a statement like that, I suppose.”

“No,” agreed Jozu, “but explain. Please.”

“Ace is _alive?” _Izou repeated, slamming a hand to the table and rising from his chair before Marco could even open his mouth, “what is this, Marco? Some kind of cruel joke? You expect us to believe that, after we all watched him get murdered?”

The others broke into speech immediately, some telling Izou to settle down and listen, others demanding to know what Marco thought he was playing at. He couldn’t say he blamed them - if anyone else had said something as thoughtless as this, he too would have been furious.

Marco raised his hands in the air to ask for silence, palms open. The commanders quietened down, Izou, Rakuyo and Curiel looking outraged beyond the others. Vista and Jozu leaned in closer, clearly the only two at the table who were already convinced despite the lack of evidence or compelling argument, never capable of doubting their brother-turned-captain.

“I don’t expect you to believe me,” Marco said calmly, directing his words at Izou, “I barely believe myself. All I want is an opportunity to explain myself. I don’t understand either, but I’m sure I’m right.” Izou made a derisive noise, lip curling, an expression that was not unfamiliar on his pretty face but one that Marco had rarely ever had directed at himself. “This isn’t a joke. I’m not doing this as part of some crazed grasp at straws or something. You know what Ace was to me, Izou. Please.”

Izou regarded him for a long moment through narrowed eyes, then sat back in his chair, folded his arms across his chest, and nodded.

“Right,” Marco shifted his weight from one foot to the other, trying to get everything from the last hour in order in his mind. “Let’s start there: what Ace was to me. As you all know, Ace and I were close; closer than any two people could usually get, I’m guessing. You all remember how I told you that when he died, I felt something physically ripped out of me?”

He tapped at his chest over his heart, and the commanders nodded - there was no way they could forget that conversation. Not after the way Marco had broken down mid explanation, the word _love _catching in his throat and rendering him speechless and shaking, face hidden by his palms. Izou looked humbled, like he was beginning to regret snapping at his new captain.

“You know I used to be able to feel Ace’s life within me,” Marco went on, “like something physical that had taken up residence inside my heart. A bond, if you will. Call me a sap or a romantic if you like, but there was something there, something warm and comforting and definitely _him_. And, well, the long and short of it is that it’s back. I can feel him again.”

He was met with ringing silence again, no one daring to breathe, waiting for him to continue. Only Marco wasn’t entirely sure how to put it into words.

“And when did this start?” Curiel asked, removing the immediate burden of forming a coherent sentence. “Must’ve been recent; I can’t see you keeping quiet about something like this.”

“About an hour ago,” Marco said, shooting a glance at Izou when he made a scathing noise.

“You certainly aren’t working to the rule of ‘wait and see’, are you?” Izou remarked, and Marco had to agree with him. He did typically adopt this approach, or at least when it came to overly dramatic patients insisting their pain was a 10/10 while also accepting a beer in the same breath. This, however, was not even remotely in the same category of _urgent_ as a bunch of drunks with hangovers crowding his study.

“It’s just a feeling,” he said slowly, thinking hard, “but it’s real. As I said, about an hour ago, while talking to Vista, that… _something _of Ace’s came back out of nowhere. That link. I can feel it now, I can feel something that’s been missing ever since he died.”

“You sure you didn’t just fall in love with Vista there, cap? Maybe created a link to the new love of your life?” Haruta offered to lighten the tension in the room, making several of the men huff with laughter, including Marco.

“Maybe,” Marco indulged.

“But how is this possible?” Izou pressed, “how can Ace possibly be alive? It’s been over eight months, Marco, no one can just—” he threw his hands up in an irritated gesture, “they can’t just come back to life. You don’t even know if you, a literal phoenix, can bring yourself back to life. How could Ace do it?”

“I don’t know,” Marco admitted, “I really have no ideas. And I don’t know why it’s happened now. I just _know_. I’m sure of it.”

“And Pops?” Namur interjected before Izou could say anything else. “What about him? If Ace is back as you say, then Pops has to be, too. Right?”

God, Marco sure hoped so. As the table dissolved into discussion again, Marco found himself hoping against hope that Whitebeard was alive too, perhaps with Ace right now, the two of them together and healthy and ready to come home.

“I only know about Ace,” Marco said once the chatter quietened down again, “but yes, if he’s back then I guess it’s possible that Pops is, too. But I have no way of knowing.”

“You have no way of knowing that you’re right about Ace, either,” Rakuyo grunted, a rare instance of open objection against Marco, “yet you’re trying your damn best to convince us you are.”

Marco frowned in thought. “Correct. You’re absolutely correct. This could be nothing. I could be wrong and setting us up for heartache of the kind we really don’t need any more of.”

“But you do not think you are wrong,” Vista said smoothly.

Marco paused for a heartbeat. “It is illogical. It goes against everything we know, everything we’ve ever learned from battles and war and generally understanding how life works. The dead do not come back. It isn’t open to discussion, it isn’t a _sometimes _or a _just this once_. We know this. So this,” Marco patted at his chest again, “goes against everything that is within our scope of knowledge. It’s wrong. But still, I…”

“You do not think you are wrong,” Jozu repeated Vista’s words.

“No, I don’t. Not anymore,” Marco concluded. He met Jozu’s gaze, seeing only trust reflected back at him. Jozu, who had lost an arm in the war, the injury too severe for Marco to heal… Jozu, who would follow Marco anywhere under any conditions, accepting anything he told him as the absolute truth… “It’s infuriating because I can’t accept such a ridiculous concept. I can’t believe that someone would come back to life just because we miss him or—” his voice cracked suddenly, “or because we want him to. But I’m equally convinced that I’m right.”

The others still looked sceptical, but at least now they weren’t staring at him like he had completely lost his mind.

“You seem like you’re trying to talk yourself into doing something stupid,” Izou pointed out, “seeing as you’re so convinced that you’re both right and wrong at the same time.”

“Not something stupid,” Marco corrected, “but something useful. I want to go to Sphinx and verify for myself whether he’s back or not.”

Izou cocked an eyebrow at Marco. “Well, I guess that settles it,” he said, words dripping with sarcasm, “our dear captain fancies himself a trip when we’re right in the middle of planning for the most important battle since Marineford! And for what? A whim? A feeling?” Izou sneered. “Off you go then, Marco, and give my regards to any zombies you find wandering around, won’t you?”

Marco had expected this from Izou. Izou, flawlessly loyal and who would die for Marco if required without hesitation, could not be expected to have any leniency for irrational thoughts or plans now, which was precisely how Marco’s big reveal had to be coming across. He was right - they _were _in the final stages of planning to go after Teach themselves, to take him head on and get revenge for their father, for Ace, and for Thatch. The souls of the dearly departed would not rest in peace until the bastard got what he deserved, until the men he had once called brothers served him the death sentence he was so rightfully owed.

“You should go,” Vista said solemnly, rising from his chair also, leaning over to clap a large hand to Marco’s shoulder. “You are not a man who acts on impulse; we know this well enough. You are not, dare I say it, anything like our beloved late brother.” Marco knew Vista was referring to how Ace had taken off after Teach upon the discovery of Thatch’s body, rage carrying his feet away from Whitebeard’s warnings and the crew’s pleadings. “You would not suggest leaving us at such a crucial time if you were in significant doubt.” Izou had the good grace to avert his gaze when Vista looked pointedly at him.

“Izou,” Marco said quietly, thankful that the beautiful man looked at him when addressed, “I’m not looking to drive us apart. I’m not trying to run away. I just have to know if I’m right. What if I am, and Ace is there, alive, lost and confused and alone? We couldn’t just leave him there. We have to get him back.”

“_If _he’s alive,” Izou sniffed.

“Yes,” Marco conceded, “if.” Izou sighed through his nose, his chest deflating slowly. Even Rakuyo looked less inclined to protest now. “I won’t be gone for long. I’ll fly to Sphinx, snatch him up if he’s there, pay my respects to them both if he isn’t, and I’ll come straight back.” He was not proud of the fact that his voice shook with the sudden surge of emotion he received from the thought of having Ace back again after so long apart, after the devastation of losing both him and Pops in one single day. “I’m not abandoning you. Any of you,” he added, looking to his other commanders.

“We would all do the same if we knew in our hearts that our brother was alive,” Jozu said softly.

“But you can understand, I hope, why we are not all jumping for joy and celebrating Ace’s return?” Kingdrew spoke up, his tone gentle rather than harsh like Izou and Rakuyou had been, putting his words across as mere curiosity and not anger. “We can’t feel what you do. To us, you’ve just pulled this out of the air with no backing or anything at all.”

“I understand that,” Marco said, “and I wish I could give you something more solid to go on. All I’m asking for is your trust right now.”

“Something that you have always had,” Kingdrew replied, and, to Marco’s relief, everyone nodded in agreement.

“You must go and see for yourself,” Vista said, “there will be no harm done in simply checking. We will manage perfectly fine without you.”

“You’ve gotta go, Marco,” Haruta piped up, looking upset and close to tears all of a sudden, “just in case.”

“Just in case,” Curiel and Namur echoed.

“And when you get him back here,” Fossa growled around his cigar, leaning forward on a hairy forearm, “we’ll make damn sure that fool doesn’t leave us ever again. Dammit, he’s _our _fool and we miss him, right, boys?”

A resounding chorus of ‘aye’s rung through the small room; Fossa nudged Izou when he alone didn’t say anything, and Izou sighed dramatically.

“If this turns out to be nothing but age catching up with you,” he pointed at Marco, frowning at his captain’s expression of relief mingled with joy, “then I’m calling a mutiny and taking your position. Agreed?”

Oh, he agreed all right. Izou could have the title now and let Marco slide back into the rank he belonged to.

But first, Marco had a brother in arms to go pick up.

* * *

Marco was far less calm within himself than the image he had demonstrated in front of the commanders. He was restless as he packed a small bag with a map, log pose, and money. He had no idea what state he would find Ace and possibly Pops in, or if he would find them at all, he had to keep reminding himself.

The shard in his heart kept him from doubting himself too long each time he paused, calculating the possibilities and likelihood of things going dramatically wrong. It pulsed warm within him, a constant, gentle reminder that he was once again linked to Ace.

Ace, for reasons only guessed at, had never been able to feel Marco as the older man did. He had used to enjoy joking about how it must be part of Marco’s powers, that phoenixes mate for life and marked their partners accordingly, and Marco had thought that Ace had been spot on. Ace had not been his first love by any stretch of the imagination, but he had been his greatest by astronomical lengths, the first person that Marco knew he would do anything for - and had actually meant it this time. Ace’s selflessness, his caring nature, and the way he could light up any room he walked into with nothing but his smile had set him apart in ways Marco couldn’t hope to describe, and those traits made him feel warm just remembering them.

Marco gripped the handle of his door before swinging it open, gathering himself. This was all happening so _fast_. One moment he had been just going about his day, speaking with Vista about Teach’s latest heading, and then out of nowhere… _this. _He wouldn’t be exaggerating to say it was overwhelming, frightening, and just that little bit exciting.

The nagging question of _why now _would not leave him be, bothering him incessantly. Why now, after so long, after he had finally allowed sadness and grieving to give way to something far darker, twisted, and violent? Now, weeks into submerging himself in the thick, suffocating pull of hate for Teach, finally ready to get his revenge? Marco had no answers and no theories, a feeling in itself that was jarring and foreign.

He took a steadying breath and pulled the door open, bag secured to his back ready for flight, and hailed Vista and Jozu. He would have hours to think about the questions he had, the flight to Sphinx being a long and potentially difficult one from their current position.

The first twinge of a headache had Marco rubbing at his forehead roughly, once again manually healing the problem. That was the second time today.

Marco did _not _like coincidences.

* * *

The sun was shining overhead by the time Ace’s little ramshackle boat nudged into the shore of the island. He couldn’t fathom a clue as to how he was still alive, or how he had even made it at all. He hadn’t seen the sun setting the day before and so hadn’t been able to use that to guide him, relying entirely on the wind and the stars to give him some indication as to where he was heading. He hadn’t known his starting location either, which had made the whole ordeal even more interesting.

But he had somehow made it thanks to his bizarre stroke of luck, and as he raised his head above the side of the little boat he felt sure that he was indeed on a new island; it wouldn’t be the first time someone had simply got turned around in open waters and ended up right back where they had started, after all. The scenery was entirely different to where he had left, with no signs of grass as far as he could see and no coves, either. He had drifted into what looked like a beach harbour lined with little fishing boats, great palm trees lining the sand along with rows of shrubbery where sand met dirt path.

His body ached worse than ever, trembling violently with the effort of sitting upright on the bottom of his craft. The sun was warming him now and had been since it had risen an hour or so ago, but Ace had been sure for a while that he was going to die from the cold. He had huddled tight on himself, arms pressed to his abdomen and held in place by his knees, chin tucked in to his chest, doing all he could to keep his body heat in now that he faced life without his powers. He felt fatigued, his tongue as dry as parchment in his mouth, his head spinning from dehydration and exposure.

He heaved himself up, fully intent on climbing over the side of the boat, and then the whole world spun and his vision swam.

Ace’s chin hit the wooden beam as his hand slipped, arms shaking and unable to support his weight. He bit his tongue and tasted blood, grunting from the pain, before the ache in his head reached its peak and the world went entirely out of focus. He slumped forward, arms dangling over the side of the boat, unable to sit up, and just as the world around him began to recede to black, he thought he heard a child’s voice cry, “Papa, there’s a dead man in that boat!”

Ah, so he had died again. That had to be it.

“He ain’t dead, girl, I saw him movin’.” Perhaps not entirely dead, then, although he sure felt that he was heading that way. The sound of sandals crunching in the sand seemed to perforate Ace’s awareness from a mile away, and he barely registered his shoulder being shaken roughly. “Oi, son, you still with us?” A gruff male voice rasped.

And then Ace lost consciousness, slumping back into the belly of the boat.

* * *

It was the smell of something delicious cooking that roused Ace from a sleep as complete as death, drawing him back to reality at a comfortable pace rather than the unfriendly _snap _he had experienced upon waking in his grave.

He opened his eyes slowly, lids heavy with the pull of a good rest, and he felt warm, wrapped up in something remarkably soft and comforting. He blinked, unwilling to do much more than that, his body certainly not up to the task of allowing him to spring from where he lay to defend himself.

Only there was nothing to defend against, he realised. Ace’s eyes travelled over his immediate surroundings, taking in the small bedroom he was in. A ceiling-high bookcase stood against the wall opposite him that was filled and bowing with books of all sizes, little ornaments relating to the sea scattered in front of them. A tiny wooden model of a ship stood in the middle shelf, and a sprinkling of interestingly shaped coral and shells adorned the other shelves. He glanced down and found the source of his comfort in the form of a thick blanket pulled tight around him, tucked under the mattress. A photo hung on the white wall that the bed rested against, although it was too high up to properly make out the faces of the people in it.

Biting back the groan of protest that tried to leave him, Ace struggled against the tightly tucked in blanket to sit up. He still had his shirt on, thank goodness, meaning that whoever had brought him in here hadn’t seen his tattoos and he hadn’t given himself away mere hours into his revival.

Ace couldn’t believe that he had made it to the island. It was only now that he fully appreciated just how dire his situation had been. What the hell had he been thinking, taking to the sea of the New World in the dark, without any points of reference, heading to who knew where? This streak of idiocy had to stop, Ace decided firmly, rubbing the heels of his palms into his eyes.

Curiously, though, his body had stopped hurting. Completely. Once the sweet pull of sleep had slipped away entirely, Ace felt… perfectly fine. His headache was gone, his muscles no longer ached as if he had just run a marathon after a three day hike, and… He stuck a grimy finger in his mouth to feel for the injury to his tongue, but he found nothing. It should have hurt if nothing else, surely?

The only thing that stuck out as unusual about his body was the warmth in his chest. Ace placed a hand to the scar in the center of his chest, running his fingers over the bumpy flesh. It didn’t feel any warmer to the touch than the rest of his body, but he could feel it inside him. Within him. A flame, almost, was the best way to describe it, a flame that flickered on the inside. It felt reassuringly familiar, not anything like his own fire that he missed terribly, and not unlike the flame he was sure he had seen back under the ground the day before, bright and blue and distinctive.

Similar, if he may entertain such a thought, to the warmth he would feel whenever Marco was near.

A knock at the door almost had Ace pulling the thick blanket up to his chin on reflex. The door creaked open and in stomped a middle-aged man, slightly bowed at the waist in a manner that spoke of years upon years of hard graft. His short, wiry gray hair and weathered, tanned skin gave him the look of a wizened gorilla, frown tugging at his bristly eyebrows. He balanced a tray in his free hand, bringing in the smell of something delicious with him.

“Good, you’re up,” the man grunted, shutting the door behind himself. “Was beginnin’ to think my daughter was right and you’d gone and died on me.”

The man held out the tray to Ace, raising his eyebrows encouragingly when Ace looked at him. Ace reached out and took it, stomach churning over at the sight of the white fish and bread. “Thank you,” he gasped, barely audible over the sound of his stomach wailing for the meal, and Ace couldn’t help but notice how much stronger his voice was now compared to those few strained words uttered on the previous island.

“Nothin’ fancy,” the man said, pulling up a wicker chair from in front of the bookcase and sitting heavily in it, “just enough for your stomach to work around. Don’t want you chuckin’ it all up again over my bed, do I?” He chuckled when Ace didn’t respond. “Well go on,” he said briskly, “it ain’t gonna kill you, boy. Don’t reckon nothin’ would, not after you survivin’ the open waters around here.”

Ace didn’t need telling twice. He grabbed at the bread and ripped into it, his overjoyed stomach thundering away it’s pleasure at something proper to work with at long last. He gagged on the bread in his haste, earning himself a slap on the back and a cup of water that he hadn’t noticed before moved from the nightstand to his tray.

“Steady now, lad,” the man instructed, “don’t rush yourself. How long’ve you gone without food?”

Ace fought back the words _eight months_ with difficulty, figuring that his garbage raid couldn’t really count for anything. “Can’t remember,” he said around a stuffed mouth, cheeks full of the fluffy white bread, “too long.”

The man gave a hearty laugh. “Well, eat that up and see how you’re farin’,” he said genially, “if your tum can take it, I’ve got plenty more where that came from.”

But a thought had just occurred to Ace, and he slowed down his frantic chewing as he studied the unknown man’s face. “I have nothing to give you in return,” he said, for he had no money, no items to trade, nothing at all except the shirt on his back (that he was absolutely not proud of stealing, now that he thought about it). “I can’t repay you for the meal or the bed.”

“Ah, son,” the man waved a hand airily, “I don’t need nothin’ from a man who clearly ain’t got much goin’ for him. You’re fine.” He paused, bringing his fingers to his smooth chin and drumming them there in thought. “Although,” he added, “I wouldn’t mind learnin’ your name and story. Somethin’ tells me it’s a goodun. Don’t get many folk washing up on shore like hunks of seaweed, lemme tell you.”

Ace was touched by the man’s kindness, something that he had all but forgotten could exist in the hearts of strangers. But he found he couldn’t answer him immediately; how could he give him his name? Ace’s name was bound to be world famous now, more so than it had been when he had been under Whitebeard’s command, and it wasn’t like it was a common name that just about anyone could feasibly sport. He knew this would have come up sooner or later into his second life, knowing full well that in order to protect himself he would have to create a fake alias, but Ace hadn’t accounted for the possibility of it being sprung on him so soon.

“My name’s…” The words stuck in his mouth with the bread, unable to think of a name. Any name would do, _anything_, because Ace would almost definitely never see this man again once he left, so anything at all would suffice—

“Ah, son, don’t worry if it ain’t comin’ to you,” the man cut his thoughts off with another dismissive wave of his hand, “amnesia, right? Can’t remember your name? Mad how things like that can addle the brain. You faced a big trauma or somethin’ out there? That why you came driftin’ in with the mornin’ trawlers?”

Ace snorted. _Trauma _just about covered the literal hell he had clawed through mere hours ago.

“Knew it,” the man said in a satisfied tone; Ace’s expression must have given something critical away, “knew you were an interestin’ story just waitin’ to be read. Not to worry, boy, I’m sure it’ll come back to you.”

Ace had to wonder what this man would make of him if he actually did tell him everything that had happened, even the part of popping out of the ground like a merry little weed in the middle of a lawn.

“Is that why you picked me up?” Ace asked, something of a grin tugging at his lips as he practically inhaled the fish on his plate. “Figured I’d have something to entertain you with?”

“Sure, I guess,” the man admitted unashamedly, “though it was more to do with my girl wantin’ to help you. Well, that, and I have a big ol’ soft heart,” he added as an afterthought, thumping his fist to his chest, “I know when someone really needs my help. You passin’ out right in front’a me was about as obvious as it gets.”

“I passed out?” Ace could barely remember what had happened upon banking in the sand, the memory getting lost in the mess of the whole ordeal.

“Sure did,” the man nodded, “watched you nearly knock yourself out first, hittin’ your chin on the side’a your boat like tha’. You didn’t knock a tooth out, did you?” When Ace shook his head, the man leaned forward and extended his hand all of a sudden, grinning. “By the way, forgot to introduce meself. Name’s Eddie. Fisherman here on Poiscatus Island.”

Pain rippled through Ace as he shook Eddie’s extended hand. Emotional pain that swallowed him slowly, like the sun getting blocked out by a rain cloud. Of all the names this man could have, it had to be that.

“And I take it Eddie’s short for…?” Ace prompted, already knowing the answer.

“Edward,” Eddie confirmed, “but don’t call me that. No one but my late mother has ever called me that, and besides,” he heaved a great sniff, “bit too close to that Whitebeard fella, right? Edward Newgate. C’mon son, don’t tell me you’ve lost the greatest story of the last two decades to the amnesia too, eh?”

Ace doubted anything could ever make him forget Pops’ name for as long as he lived this time around. He should have seen this coming, and he really shouldn’t have directed the conversation towards it. There was no way that Whitebeard and the war weren’t still the hottest topic on every pair of lips in the world - the Strongest Man in the World had been taken down; how could that _not _be the most interesting thing to talk about, even months later? But Ace didn’t want to talk about him or what had happened. He didn’t want to know how Whitebeard had finally been bested, or how his crew had got away afterwards, or how the marines had surely made a sickening parade of the whole miserable day. Ace wouldn’t be surprised to learn that every marine there had received a promotion just for surviving, celebrating raucously while Marco and the others were left to mourn the loss of their father.

But Eddie surprised Ace enough to draw his gaze up from his empty plate back to his tanned, lined face.

“I dunno where you stand on the whole shitshow, lad,” Eddie said with a grunt, “but personally, I think it’s a shame what happened to Newgate. Say what you like about pirates as a whole - can’t say I care for the majority of ‘em - but Newgate was all right. Real sad, that was. His boys were proper gooduns too; dunno if you knew much about them. Probably not, seeing as you’re young.”

“I’ve heard of them,” Ace muttered, suddenly missing his old crew enormously.

“I’ll never forget the day they stopped off here to load up with fish,” Eddie continued as if Ace hadn’t spoken. “Bought just about every barrel we had! Never seen a man like Newgate. Fuckin’ enormous he was, I mean yeah, we’ve all read about his size in the papers, but nothin’ will ever prepare you right for seein’ someone that _big _in person. Real gent too. But d’you wanna know somethin’ real funny?”

Ace looked up at Eddie again; Eddie was grinning ear to ear, as if the memory of whatever he was about to reveal with the most hilarious thing he’d ever witnessed.

“Go for it.”

“When it came to payin’ for all their shit, Newgate turned to his first mate, that Marco guy who’s taken over as cap’n now—” Ace’s stomach clenched uncomfortably around his meal, “—and asked him for money! It was mad, I’d never seen anythin’ like it. Like a kid asking their Papa for pocket money. Had me absolutely howlin’, the way Newgate looked all embarrassed ‘bout not havin’ anythin’ on him.”

Of course he had. Pops had never carried money - or even had any to call his own - at any point in his time under the title of Whitebeard. Ace had heard from Marco that everything Pops earned in his share of loots got sent straight back to his home island, a poor place somewhere in the New World that Ace had never had the chance to visit with them. So of course he hadn’t been able to pay for their stock himself. Although why it hadn’t fallen to Thatch to handle the trade on this particular occasion left Ace confused, seeing as he had known Thatch to be a keen haggler and tight with the purse strings.

Ace rubbed angrily at his eyes while Eddie laughed at the memory, taking advantage of the way the fisherman closed his eyes with the force of it. Remembering Thatch _hurt_, and remembering how Ace had failed to avenge him only drove that spike of remorse and guilt that much deeper into his chest. If anyone should have been given a second chance, why not Thatch?

“But yeah,” Eddie concluded, laughter subsiding, “I’ll fight anyone who spits at that crew. Already have done, as a matter of fact. Great bunch. They did great work for their turf. I ain’t got nothin’ bad to say about that lot.” Eddie eyed Ace intensely as if challenging him to speak out against the Whitebeards, but Ace just nodded along with him. “Speakin’ of,” Eddie started up again after a heartbeat, “you look a lot like that lad from that crew who died. That one that got named as the Pirate King’s kid. Got a face full’a freckles like he did.”

This was what he had been afraid of. Having his link to Roger spoken of so casually, everyone in the world finally knowing just what he was and being able to identify him as easily as if he had it signposted above his head. His attempts to alter his appearance suddenly seemed laughably feeble, and Ace was immediately aware of his hair tickling his jaw, the cord that had tied it up long gone somewhere unknown. Eddie was staring into the face of a ghost, a dead man, and yet there was no way he would ever believe what he was looking at to be true. Surely.

Ace had never once been someone to hide, or to run away, or to roll over and accept what life was trying to dish out for him. But perhaps dying had a way of changing how people thought, Ace considered, searching Eddie’s shockingly blue eyes, because he honestly couldn’t say he felt much in the way of shame at the thought of self-preservation anymore. If lying low meant he stayed alive for one more day this time around, then so be it.

Ace had had a long time alone in that little boat to think, and the conclusion he had arrived at was to make the most of this chance after all. What good would it do to die again? It would be an insult to all those who had given their lives for him, a middle finger thrust in the faces of everyone who loved him. It would be straight up rejection of Pops, telling the memory of him that the life he had fought so hard to protect was not worthy of cherishing.

And Ace would never, ever do anything to go against Whitebeard again.

“Sorry, I’m drawing a blank here,” Ace lied easily, “I can’t remember anything about some son of Roger’s.”

Unfortunately for him, Eddie seemed only too happy to fill him in. “Course you don’t, son, if you can’t even remember your name,” Eddie said apologetically. “Well, this lad of Newgate’s, one of his commanders, Ace - turns out he was Roger’s kid somehow. Somethin’ about the mother holding him in her womb for near on two years to avoid detection. Load of shit, if you ask me.”

“You think so?” Ace asked, surprised at Eddie’s disbelief. The man struck Ace as something of a conspiracy theory type, someone who loved to get their hands on tales of all proportions and run amok with them.

“You kiddin’ me?” Eddie snorted, “no way was this guy Roger’s boy. No, if you ask me, it was a story cooked up by that marine Sengoku as a way of drummin’ up an excuse to go all out against Newgate. Just wanted a reason to justify to all us normals why he was mobilisin’ such a force against a Yonko and his allies. That lad was just a decoy, the bait. Sengoku knew Newgate would come get him - that’s what he does, see? That’s what made him so great. Newgate never left any of his own behind. And yet the marines made a show of humiliatin’ him to the world. Well, they’ve lost any respect I had for them, the lot of ‘em.”

So Eddie _was _the conspiracy theory type after all. If Ace hadn’t been the man in question, if he had been a civilian living a simple life away from the war and pirates, he might have been inclined to believe Eddie was right. It was a shame he wasn’t.

“When that boy Ace told Sengoku his father was Newgate—” Eddie slapped his knee gleefully, “goddamn, lad, you shoulda seen the look on the old bastard’s face!”

Ace hadn’t seen his expression, but he clearly remembered the anger in Sengoku’s voice at his refusal to play along with his grand reveal.

“Anyway,” Eddie growled, leaning forward in the chair with a creak, “listen, son, you’re welcome to stay the night if you want - I’m not kind enough to give up my bed overnight, but the couch is plenty comfortable enough. I promise I won’t bore you with no more crap about pirates, either. I’ve gotta go back to the boat and get workin’, but if you have nowhere else to go, I wouldn’ say no to an extra pair of hands today.”

No, Ace didn’t have anywhere else to go. He had nothing whatsoever other than his guilt and his longing for Luffy and Marco, the shaky plan he had made back on Sphinx sufficiently completed. He had, by all accounts, no direction now, nothing concrete to live for. His vague desire to find Luffy wasn’t coming to fruition in his plans of where to go now, seeing as finding his brother would undoubtedly lead to disaster for the boy. Ace couldn’t bear the thought of making life more difficult for Luffy, no matter how much he wanted to see him and confirm if he was even _alive. _He couldn’t convince himself that imposing upon him would be the right thing to do; not now, at the very least.

Now was not the right time for tracking Luffy down, that much was abundantly clear. He had to take this whole business of coming back to life a day at a time for the time being. Ace would build up some funds, keep his head down for a while, and scrounge any news he could gather about his brother’s whereabouts. He couldn’t imagine that Luffy had perished… although, admittedly, Ace had also never considered the possibility that Whitebeard could have fallen, either.

And Ace would absolutely not think about returning to his crew. He wouldn’t daydream about reuniting with his brothers, apologising until he could no longer speak, and being accepted back into their ranks. He wouldn’t entertain the desire to see Marco, to tell him he was sorry, to love him again and make up for the time lost to chasing Teach, being imprisoned, and then losing everything.

Ace did not do regrets. Ace learned from his decisions, and he grew, and he adapted, and he didn’t repeat mistakes. This would be no different. There was to be no more running off on an impulse, letting rage and misery carry him when the whole universe was trying to tell him it was a bad idea. There would be no more snap decisions, overestimating his own judgement and abilities - Ace was bitterly reminded yet again of how his abilities were now in fact reduced, although he did still have his haki. He would calm down, take things a little slower, and, dare he say it, be more _Marco_ about life in general.

“Whaddaya say, son?” Eddie prompted, shaking Ace out of his thoughts, “you up for makin’ a few berri today or what?”

Eddie extended his hand again, looking a little hopeful. His gaze drifted from Ace’s gray eyes down to his shoulders and arms, clearly imagining how he could put Ace’s obvious strength to good use on his fishing boat.

Ace couldn’t help but smile. This was the first thing he had had to smile about since his resurrection, the one grain of good floating untainted in the fetid soup of wretched misery. This was as good a place to start as any, and he could always move on the next morning if any news on Luffy happened to come to light today.

“It’d be my pleasure,” Ace agreed, taking Eddie’s hand and giving it a firm shake, “and I’ll think about taking you up on your offer of staying the night too.”

“Ah, Annie will like that,” Eddie grinned and stood, stretching his back. “My daughter,” he added, noticing Ace’s questioning look, “she’s only ten, but she helps me out best she can. She was so worried about you. She’s back at the bay, keepin’ an eye on our boat. She made that bread you ate, by the way, freshly baked firs’ thing this mornin’. You want some more?”

“Yes,” Ace said far too quickly, and Eddie chuckled as Ace’s stomach growled in agreement, “please, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all, lad,” Eddie said cheerfully, “just mind you pay me back with your life story when it comes back to you, all right? We’ll head back to the boat when you’ve had your fill and I’ll teach you what you need to know. Dead simple stuff, mind; throw the net in the water and haul us up a good catch. Easy, right? Good. Don’t bother cleanin’ up before we go - you’re gonna stink worse than the fish market under the summer sun by the time we’re done.”

* * *

Marco’s flight to Sphinx was not a smooth one, although for once this was not due to the unpredictable weather found in the New World. As far as the weather was concerned Marco had struck incredibly lucky, running into no major shifts in climate and meeting nothing in the way of freak natural disasters, making for a nice, lazy flight almost entirely over open water. The sky was clear as night rolled in, and Marco was able to navigate with ease using his instinctual internal compass and the stars overhead.

What made the flight tricky was Marco’s own mind. Doubt had settled over him barely an hour into his journey, forcing him to turn back to the crew and get almost all the way home again before he was able to talk himself out of giving up. The word _if _kept echoing in his mind in Izou’s voice over and over, making this whole venture seem increasingly ridiculous and farfetched. Because it was, if he turned inwards and had an honest discussion with himself. It was ridiculous to the nth degree. Everything about this rested solely on Marco’s instinct and gut feeling (or, rather, heart feeling), something that he never usually let lead him without _some _form of evidence to support him.

So Marco had battled with himself repeatedly, flying for several hours towards Sphinx only to turn back and fly home from anywhere between twenty minutes to an hour at a time, making his journey far longer than it would have been had he just shut off his damn brain and _gone_.

All in all the flight to Sphinx ended up taking Marco a good sixteen hours, and when he did finally arrive he made sure not to come in to land directly at the grave site. Marco set down at the foot of the slope leading up to the resting place of his most loved people, feet transforming first back into human before the rest of his body followed seconds later. He was tired, and he was cold, but these were things that his powers would deal with now that he had stopped.

Now that he could think about it and manually repair the tiny hairline tears to his muscles, neutralise the lactic acid, and dispel the cold that was creeping down to his bones. These processes should have been automatic, as all healing processes were supposed to be, and Marco should have landed in the same state of rest as he had taken off in.

Marco was beginning to accept that perhaps this was not a coincidence at all. That didn’t mean he had to like it, however.

But puzzling out his change in regenerative abilities could wait until after he had found Ace.

The high winds that had whipped through Sphinx the night previous had died down significantly, leaving nothing but a gentle breeze ruffling Marco’s hair as he climbed the slope up to the graves. He couldn’t pretend that he wasn’t nervous - terrified, even - of what was to come upon cresting that hilltop.

Knowing Ace has well as he had done, Marco was certain that the man would blame himself entirely for everything that had happened leading up to and during the war. In those scant few letters Marco had received before Ace’s fateful showdown with Teach, Ace had made it quite plain that he blamed himself for Thatch’s death and for Teach’s desertion, so it would not be outside the realms of possible that he would believe himself responsible for the war in its entirety.

Despite understanding how Ace could reach such a miserable conclusion, Marco couldn’t even entertain the thought of agreeing with it. He, like the rest of the commanders, didn’t blame Ace for his own or Pops’ passing. No, the blame rested squarely upon Teach’s shoulders, and even though everyone shared the sentiment that Ace shouldn’t have chased after the traitor, that did not render him at fault for what had come next.

But the half-formed thoughts of reciting loving lines to Ace, of clearing up the incorrect belief that he was to blame and that Marco would no longer love him for it, were wiped cleanly out of Marco’s mind as the graves came into view, nestled together on that hilltop.

Ace was not there. Neither was Pops. No one was waiting for him. The area was clear, utterly and completely devoid of anyone but himself, standing alone, mouth open in defeat, yet not as surprised as he thought he would feel.

Marco’s fists balled tight and he bit his lip angrily, refusing to let the bitter swell of being so completely let down and proven wrong to ensnare him. He had been wrong. Whatever he felt warming him from the inside was not Ace, could _never _be Ace. Death was an absolute, it was final, it was over and Marco had to damn well accept that. He allowed his feet to walk him closer to the headstones, though, despite how Marco now wanted nothing more than to rage, scream, cry, and let it all out - all the hope turned sour, curdling into a lump of anger and remorse that sat heavy in his throat, choking him.

He watched Whitebeard’s coat flutter serenely on the breeze, took in the arrangement of new flowers that had been laid since the last time he had been here, and finally allowed his gaze to settle on Ace’s hat.

It was a ludicrous thing, Marco had always thought, so vibrant and gaudy and impossible not to look at. He supposed that was precisely why Ace had liked it so much, as the man had forever taken steps to get himself noticed at all times.

And the red beaded necklace that hung below it; Marco remembered fondly how he had mended it once before Ace had joined their crew properly. It had been the first time they had spoken at length, and the first time Ace had shown any semblance of vulnerability in from of Marco. He watched it ripple in the breeze, missing Ace more completely now than he had allowed himself to for months. All those little memories of Ace, all those tiny snapshots of a life and a love lost to the hatred of death, blurred Marco’s vision.

Try as he might to forget, the memories came unbidden; how Ace had felt when he leaned against him. The feel of Ace’s hair running through Marco’s fingers. The warmth of his skin when Marco cupped freckled cheeks. Ace’s body pressed flush to his under thin sheets, hotter than human, passionate as sin, all undulating muscle and sweat and fierce worship for each other. How it felt to mix their fire, the way it drew them so insatiably further into a bond unlike any other before it. How Marco would never feel any of those things again.

Marco honestly couldn’t believe he had been wrong. His gaze flickered down to the nearest bouquet of flowers, fresh and new as if they had only been laid there that day, despite how Marco had arrived not long after sunrise. He willed himself not to succumb and cry, to lay his head to the marble and let it drain from him like pus from an infected wound - all his hope, his elation, the promise of a reunion dangled in front of him only to be snatched away again. Izou had been so right, completely correct, and Marco was a fool.

The shard within him pulsed warm as if mocking him in that moment, and Marco was visited by the violent temptation to pluck his heart from his chest and examine the damn thing with his own eyes. He made another attempt at healing it manually, but once again nothing happened - his powers deemed there nothing to fix, nothing going wrong at all, and the pulse of warmth, of comfort and love, washed over him once again.

He blinked rapidly, determined not to shed any tears over his incredible stupidity. Marco looked up again to focus on Ace’s possessions in front of himself, trying to take his mind off the hopelessness of the morning by mentally insulting his late partner’s taste in accessories (not that Marco himself had a leg to stand on, really).

Ace’s dumb hat. Ace’s dumb necklace. Ace’s dumb dagger—

—that was missing.

Marco stood rigid, frowning at where the missing item was supposed to hang. It should have been there. He himself had hung it there, taking it from Shanks’ hands when the Yonko had arrived with both Ace and Pops’ possessions - Marco had never asked how he had managed to procure them all.

He checked around the headstone. Not there.

He checked around Pops’ too. Not there, either.

Surely no one would steal it, would they? Marco liked to think that no one would do such a thing, or if they were going to stoop so low as to steal from the dead they would have taken something more iconic as a keepsake, such as that damn hat. But no, only the dagger was missing.

Only the item that could have been determined as useful to someone who wanted to escape and lay low.

Marco turned on his heel and looked down, excitement and wonder ramping up inside him again, that _something_ in his heart seeming to know what he was thinking and flooding him with warmth more acute than any pulse it had delivered beforehand. He hadn’t given the earth above which the bodies of the departed rested any consideration, and in hindsight that was downright stupid, a mistake on his part of the likes that he didn’t usually make. Marco had been blinded by the draw to the headstones and by the lack of anyone waiting for him, stopping him from doing something that should have come naturally and scanning the area for anything out of place.

And there _was _something. Something right there at his feet.

The ground had been recently disturbed and hastily covered up to look like it hadn’t, Marco guessed. He pressed his heel into the earth tentatively and felt the give in it, springy and light, not compact like it should have been. The grass that grew on top of the earth was disturbed and all over the place, like it had been dug up and patted back down again. Marco squatted down on his heels and touched the soil, excitement mounting. Yes, it had been dug up, definitely, very recently. Marco rolled up his sleeves and noted how his hands were trembling slightly from the adrenaline that was rushing around his system at his discovery.

But he paused, fingers pressed to the earth, taking a moment to think about what he was about to do. He had to verify that Ace wasn’t down there still, he _had _to, before he ran around the island looking for his partner. Of course Ace hadn’t hung around waiting to be picked up - Marco could have slapped himself for allowing himself to even _think _that Ace would be sitting here, waiting. _Of course_ he would have taken off on his own, probably confused beyond measure and having no clue what was going on. He wouldn’t have known that Marco was alerted to his revival, or that Marco was coming for him, and he would have had no reason to remain at his own grave.

Marco laughed, high pitched and shrill and like relief given voice, at his own stupidity.

But could he really desecrate a grave to confirm what he was now convinced to be true? Could he really dig it up, knowing full well that he could potentially find his loved one’s corpse there instead of the empty coffin he expected?

The answer was yes. Yes, he could.

And he would.

And he did.

It wasn’t as difficult as he had anticipated, finding the soil to be loose and light as he dug down into the ground. Marco hadn’t brought a shovel or anything to aid him with ransacking a grave, but that didn’t matter. He had no problem whatsoever with getting muddy and filthy, not if it resulted in confirming Ace’s revival. Marco needed to know for definite, now that he was here, now that he could actually _do something _and _act_ at last.

Resolve drove him downwards, getting at least three feet into the loose soil before accepting that no, he couldn’t just dig his way down like a mole, working in reverse to how Ace must have dragged himself free. Nerves fired in his stomach as he imagined how Ace must have done it, how he must have clawed his way out and then attempted to fill in the tunnel he had created before leaving. But Marco would need a far wider entry point than Ace would have required, and so he set to work on expanding the hole he had created.

It took what felt like an age to achieve his goal, shirt discarded long ago to avoid getting it filthy, a good judgement made at last as Marco was covered in dirt by the time his fingers scraped at wood. He pushed his fingers through the layer of mud that still rested on top of the coffin, scraping it away in handfuls until he found the hole that Ace had kicked through the roof. Or, rather, until he was stabbed by the splintered wood and he pulled his hand away, hissing in pain as blood dripped from his fingers. Again, Marco was forced to manually heal, blue flames illuminating the soil around him, casting shadows over the exposed wood of the coffin and confirming that there had been a break. From the inside, too, judging from the way the wood curved upwards slightly and by how, upon reaching into the breach, Marco confirmed there was soil packed tight in there.

That hadn’t been there when they had lowered the coffins, both immaculate and sturdy pieces of craft.

And there wasn’t a body in the coffin, either; Marco’s fingers slid through the earth within the coffin and bumped into the wooden flooring of it. Ace really wasn’t in there.

Which meant, with everything added together, that it was beyond reasonable doubt that Ace was alive again. Alive and wandering around Sphinx now, Marco could only surmise.

“Shit,” Marco hissed to himself, bringing a filthy hand to his face and rubbing at his forehead, not caring for a second about the grime he spread there. He grinned and squeezed his eyes shut tight, forcing the tears that welled up again to remain where they were. “I was right. You’re really back.”

And then he let himself go, opening his eyes to allow the tears of relief to run free down his cheeks. Marco figured he deserved just this one moment of weakness, if love for his partner could ever be seen as such a thing. All of the emotional fatigue of the last year or so, building gradually with each day since Ace had left on his quest, since Thatch had been murdered, seemed to ease within Marco a little bit. Now, at last, after facing loss and heartbreak of the likes he had never known, after accepting that they were gone and he was once again left standing, Marco allowed himself to really, truly, _hope _again.

He didn’t allow himself to succumb to the sweet ache of relief for too long, though, hauling himself back out of the hole with a grunt barely five minutes later. Marco filled it back in with the soil he had excavated, copying what Ace must have done himself and patting it down as best he could once it was all back in place. It was incredibly obvious that the grave had been tampered with now, and Marco figured he would have to spin some kind of story as to why he had dug down and disturbed what the world knew to be his crewmate’s resting place. He would go to this island’s village hall next, ask around and see if anyone there had seen a dishevelled man covered in mud running around recently.

But first, and perhaps more immediately important, he had the matter of Pops to attend to.

Pops, it was horribly obvious now, had not come back like Ace. There was no visible disturbance to his grave site, and Marco was fairly confident that someone so big would have not been able to return the earth to looking so neat and pristine again after bursting out of it. There was no doubt in Marco’s mind that his father still slept peaceful six feet below, ignorant to the fact that his one son had revived, and that his other now kneeled at his headstone.

Marco traced his fingers along the letters carved into marble just like Ace had done less than twenty-four hours ago, lamenting Whitebeard’s passing yet again. What he wouldn’t give to see him one more time, to tell him - _really _tell him - how much he loved him and valued him. To apologise for not doing more, apologise for not stopping Squard, for panicking at the crucial moment when Akainu drew too close to Ace, and for being the ever faithful first mate and letting Pops face Teach and his hellish crew alone.

“I’m sorry,” Marco murmured, the marble cold against his face when he rested his forehead to it. “I’m sorry for everything, Pops. But I’ll look after him this time. I’ll make sure nothing happens to Ace ever again. I’ll avenge you through taking care of him for you.”

Marco would find him, and Marco would love him, and Marco would never let anything happen to him again for as long as he lived.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Needless to say, this is not actually complete. There are two more chapters to go!
> 
> If you notice anything wrong in this chapter, such as things from the canon being blatantly incorrect, please do tell me so I can fix them. I am but a simple idiot who, despite extensive research and reading, is known to make monumentally stupid mistakes. Liberties were obviously taken with the newspaper stuff, seeing as we have no idea of most of the details during the time skip, so that's free game I guess.
> 
> If you came here hoping to see Ace beat the shit out of Blackbeard or do something mad and heroic, then you are going to be sorely disappointed, I can tell you now. Ace wouldn't stand a chance against Blackbeard, and I can't bear to write him getting beaten again. I just can't do it, friends. This is a fic that features an Ace who learns from his mistakes and isn't as reckless this time around. I'm trying to keep everyone's actions as realistic as possible here.
> 
> I'm on [Tumblr](https://aishitekuretearigatou.tumblr.com/) if you want to come say hi!
> 
> Comments and kudos let me know if I'm doing something right, and I always love your feedback!


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